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Fraud

Is it fraud if a company takes a decades-old, reliable product and changes its composition to an inferior material, which is then sold under the same name? The complaint for this class action claims cites fraud, among other things, in this case on the changed composition of Pyrex from borosilicate glass to soda lime glass.

Plaintiff Etta Calhoun had an idea for an invention, and she was attracted by InventHelp commercials, which claimed that the company had “more than 9,000 companies who have agreed to review ideas” it submits. However, the complaint for this class action alleges that InventHelp maintains a fraudulent web of companies that do nothing but defraud would-be inventors while escaping liability.

With college tuitions soaring and students having to take out enormous loans to get an education, students are looking more closely at what they’re getting for their money. The complaint for this class action alleges that for-profit college the Art Institute of New York City deliberately misled them about their prospects for employment after graduation, falsifying statistics, job status, job titles, and salary levels.

The defendants in this class action—Sovran Self Storage, Inc., Sovran Acquisition, LP, Uncle Bob’s Management, LLC, (collectively now Life Storage, Inc.)—are putting up $8 million to settle a class action alleging that they New Jersey consumer protection and other laws.

Students have arrived at a settlement with the Western Culinary Institute, now called Le Cordon Bleu College of Culinary Arts in Portland, Oregon, and the Career Education Corporation. The class action alleges that the school misrepresented or failed to disclose information about the nature and value of the education it provided to its students.

Nature’s Bounty sells vitamins and other supplements. One of its products is biotin, provided in high doses of 5,000 to 10,000 mcg. But what do such large doses of biotin actually do? Virtually nothing, the complaint claims, even though the labels claim they help hair, skin, and nails.

It’s a wonder that buyers still exist for new cryptocurrrencies that show no signs of any serious underpinnings to support their claims. The complaint for this class action alleges that BitConnect coins are unregistered securities, a fraud, and a Ponzi scheme. Income from BitConnect coins is purportedly obtained through up to 40% interest per month, an additional daily rate of interest, profits generated by “volatility software,” and a commission on purchases made by referrals. The complaint alleges that BitConnect coins are unregistered securities, sold in violation of the Securities Act of 1933, and that the defendants have engaged in common fraud as well as fraud in the purchase or sale of securities in violation of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934.

TransDigm’s profitability scheme was to price-gouge the US government, claims the complaint for this class action, in the same way as some pharmaceutical companies have tried to make big gains by buying the rights to drugs for which there are few alternatives and then jacking up the price. The complaint alleges that it has increased prices unreasonably on products for which it is the sole supplier and hidden its cost structure and even its identity from Pentagon, in violation of the rules for government contracts. The concealment of this scheme from the public, the complaint says, is a violation of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934.

Vircurex was founded in 2011 as an online exchange where users could deposit US dollars and Euros to buy, sell, and exchange digital currencies. The complaint for this class action claims that on March 24, 2014, the company froze users’ accounts by preventing them from withdrawing Bitcoin (BTC), Litecoin (LTC), Terracoin (TRC), and Feathercoin (FTC). It claimed that two hacks had depleted its funds. Although the company claimed to be slowly repaying the accounts from its income for some months, it has since ceased communication with account holders.

In a shocking public announcement in October 2107, the celebrated Kobe Steel company admitted that it had failed at quality control and falsified inspection certificates. The complaint for this class action alleges that the company deliberately hid its misconduct, in violation of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, and gave the public false and/or misleading information claiming it put a high value on compliance, ethics, and product quality.